


take it slow

by renegade_angel



Series: all my friends are heathens [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Action, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, City of Weirdos, Humor, M/M, Non-Binary Deidara, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-14 23:33:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16050863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renegade_angel/pseuds/renegade_angel
Summary: "We are a response agency that identifies, locates, and neutralizes dangerous people and situations whose threat profile is outside the scope of regular authorities.” He paused, taking in the blank faces around him. “Basically, we organize heroes to fight villains and save the world.”





	take it slow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [blackkat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/gifts), [roymustang](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roymustang/gifts).



> For blackkat, who inspired me both to write and to explore the Naruto fandom, and roymustang, whose fic "Forever And A Bit" made me fall in love with Gaara all over again. Thank you both so much for sharing your work with all of us!
> 
> This fic came about when I looked for inspiration through TV Trope's "Random Trope" button. It gave me "City of Weirdos" and then 7k words just kind of exploded from there lol. I hope you enjoy!
> 
> (I don't own anything you recognize. Titles for this fic and the series from twenty-one pilots' song "Heathens”.)

_Konoha_ , Gaara thought as he dodged a high-velocity gob of slime, _was weird as fuck._

Admittedly, he had heard that Suna wasn’t all that normal either, but what did he know? Before this, he had never been anywhere. The only reason he had even come was because his sister made him, saying something about “representing our people” and “saving the world” and “for the love of God, just go!”

He missed her already.

 _And her fans_ , he thought, ducking and spinning to avoid three more disgusting projectiles. _Those would be nice too right now._

He dropped behind a dumpster, marveling at the fact that it somehow smelled better than what he could only assume were mucus bullets. He peeked up over the edge, trying to get another look at the person causing the chaos, only to pull up short. In the eye of the snot storm stood a pre-teen kid with round glasses and sleepy eyes. As Gaara watched, he sniffed loudly, reached up to wipe his nose, took a deep breath, and sneezed. The force of it made him stumble back and a blob at least twice as big as all the others came sailing right at Gaara, somehow not hitting any of the strangely-unconcerned citizens casually walking past.

This had gone on long enough. Gaara cut to the side, uncorking the gourd of sand on his back. He’d expected some civilians to give it weird looks, not used to him like the people in Suna, but that hadn’t happened. Maybe they were all just used to the unusual.

He stopped in the middle of the street, wanting a straight shot to the kid. A bit of concentration caused sand to stream through the air, crossing the thirty feet between them, weaving around a couple passing cars, then moving to form a dome around the kid. As useful as this move was, it brought back bad memories every time he used it. He didn’t like it, but he was hesitant to hurt a child, especially one that wasn’t causing serious harm to anyone, and this gave him some time to figure out an alternative.

“UDON!”

Gaara jerked, turning to the side to see another kid running down the street, blue scarf flapping behind him. He was about to put up a sand barrier to keep him back when the kid _launched himself into the air_ , not even slowing down in his run. Gaara squinted and was able to see flames licking the bottom of his sandals, somehow keeping the kid aloft. When he got closer to his friend, he flipped in a front tuck then pushed his feet out until he was flat in the air. Flames shot out and hit the sand dome, turning part of it into glass. The kid landed and punched forward, more flames hitting the same spot and causing the whole area to turn entirely clear.

From inside, Udon punched the glass, breaking through and throwing himself through the gap. His friend offered him a fist that he dutifully bumped before they both turned back to Gaara.

“Hey, panda eyes!” the new kid shouted. “Why’d you attack my friend?! You’re gonna pay for that! He wasn’t doing anything wrong—OOF!”

While the kid had been talking, Gaara had recovered his sand from the broken dome and separated it into two parts, slithering them along the ground until they surrounded both kids’ legs. Once it had risen past their knees, Gaara squeezed it around them and jerked them to the ground, cushioning their falls with more sand. The sand then covered their arms and torsos until only the kids’ heads were poking out.

Gaara slowly sauntered over, winding around both a group of teenagers goofing off and a street performer whose violin music hadn’t stopped since Gaara arrived, and looked down at the kids. The new kid was jerking his head back and forth, trying to escape, and only stopped to glare up at Gaara. Udon seemed quietly resigned, relaxing his head back against the sand and sniffing again. Gaara spared a quick thought to how to prevent anymore phlegm missiles without suffocating the kid—it’s trickier than you think—when someone delicately cleared their throat.

“What seems to be the problem here?”

Gaara turned and found a tall man with a bandana and his hands on his hips looking between Gaara and the two children covered in sand.

“EBISU-SENSEI!” the kid shouted. _Does he only have one volume?_ Gaara thought, wincing slightly.

“Konohamaru-kun, Udon-kun,” Ebisu said. “What happened here?”

“You know these children?” Gaara asked.

The other man sighed, reaching up to push his sunglasses up his nose. “Unfortunately. These are my students. I’m sure you were entirely justified in your actions, but I can take it from here.”

Gaara eyed the man. On the one hand, this solved the problem without hurting anyone, which was slowly becoming an instinct in fights like this. But on the other, this could be a trick to let them go so their team could work together to do something worse.

…Oh, who is he kidding? Another adult who actually _wanted_ to deal with the two brats?

His sand fell away. “Good luck with them,” he said, nodding his head to Ebisu and turning to go down the street. As he walked away, he heard a new voice that had to come from the previously-silent Udon saying something about a new technique going wrong. Eh, he didn’t want to know.

He set down a new street, trying to find the landmark Temari had described to him. Though what a waterfall would be doing in the middle of a city like Konoha, Gaara didn’t know. Why couldn’t this mysterious organization give an actual address?

He wandered down the street, trying not to stare at the various odd people passing by. This worked for a couple minutes, but after a huge swarm of bugs flew by, apparently chasing some origami birds, he gave it up as a lost cause. What was even stranger though was the fact that he seemed to be the only one bothered by the bizarre happenings around him. As he watched, a dog walker maneuvered six or seven dogs out of the way of a fight between a guy surrounded by writhing shadows and another wielding a giant red scythe. A little farther down, a group of children chased each other around a sphere of water, poking it to make ripples and weaving around a green blur running in circles around it.

He must have been staring too long, trying to figure out what the green blur was, because he suddenly felt someone tap him on the shoulder. Well, try to tap him before his sand unconsciously blocked it, but it got his attention anyway. Gaara turned and was instantly blinded by a sparkling smile. He looked up and found matching sparkly eyes under the thickest eyebrows he had ever seen.

“Hello friend!” the guy shouted. _Did anyone in Konoha have an inside voice?_ “It is magnificent to behold, is it not? My mentor is so youthful and cool!”

Gaara stared. And stared. And stared some more. He finally was able to drag his eyes away, looking back at the fight. If he squinted, he was just able to see a man’s silhouette in the green blur, but only for a split second. As he turned back, he took in the fact that the teen in front of him seemed to be in a matching bright green jumpsuit and orange legwarmers. It was a bit much for Gaara to process, especially when his grin widened somehow, and he added a thumbs-up thrust in front of him. And where were those colorful lens flares coming from?

“I sense that you are overwhelmed by the abundance of our enthusiasm! Have you never seen the Green Beast of Konoha at work?” the teen asked.

“I’m not from around here,” Gaara said, his natural monotone contrasting even more sharply than usual with the stranger’s fervor.

“Ah, you are a guest in our beautiful city! May I assist you in anyway?”

Gaara paused, considering. “Doesn’t your teacher need your help?”

“Gai-sensei is the strongest man I know! He will be fine on his own for a short time. Besides, it is most youthful to help anyone in need! Gai-sensei will understand,” the teen said, somehow keeping his grin all through his speech. Then, to Gaara’s horror, he started tearing up. “Especially someone who is so concerned with the well-being of others! Why, your compassion is glorious to see, a true picture of youth!” Then he reached forward and hugged Gaara, lifting him off the ground in his zeal.

 _He smells nice_ , Gaara thought dazedly. _Like flowers_. He also couldn’t help but notice that, underneath the jumpsuit, the teen was all muscle, though the hug was still comfortable. His face flushed at that thought, making him glad his face was hidden by this very long hug.

Finally, he was put down and stepped back. Trying to ignore his still-fading blush, he met the teen’s eyes again. “Your assistance would be appreciated,” he said, inclining his head in a respectful nod. “I am Sabaku no Gaara.”

“It is nice to meet you, friend! My name is Rock Lee!” he replied, striking a pose with his fists on his hips and an extra shine in his smile. “It is my honor to help you in any way you need!”

“I’m looking for a place, but I don’t know exactly where it is. All I know is to look for a waterfall.”

“I am sorry, but I do not know where that is either,” Lee said, seeming to droop a little. But he perked up again even more intensely than before. “I would be happy to help you look though!”

“Thank you,” Gaara said. “Where do you suggest we begin?”

“There is a park one block from here that has the Nakano river running through it. Maybe it drops off somewhere in that area!”

“Lead the way, then.”

They walked down an alley and turned down a new street. Gaara was comfortable in the silence—easier to pretend at goodness when his mouth was shut—but could also hear his siblings in his head encouraging him to ignore his demons and socialize with Lee. Well, Temari would be encouraging. Kankuro would probably tease him about his “stoic reserve” and compare him to a Victorian romantic hero.

…That was remarkably specific. Kankuro must never find out that he has successfully ruined Gaara’s mind.

“You said that man is your mentor? The Green Beast?” he asked, looking at Lee out of the corner of his eye.

Lee’s smile, which had shrunk slightly, grew again to something Gaara would call “beaming.”

“Yes, Gai-sensei has been watching over me for years, teaching me how to be a hero without powers! All you need is the springtime of youth and the will of fire!”

Gaara ducked around a crowd gathered around a teenage boy directing animals made of ink as a form of street art. “If you don’t have a power, what is your strategy for fighting criminals?”

He saw Lee pause in his periphery, before jumping ahead to catch up. “I have been focusing on my strength and speed for years, building up both until I could keep up with any villain! Plus, Gai-sensei has been teaching me various forms of martial arts and strategy, so I can stay one step ahead!”

Gaara paused and turned to Lee, looking closely at his face. He wasn’t good at figuring out emotions, but something sounded off in Lee’s voice. And now there was something besides the simple joy from earlier, something… _harder_ in his eyes.

“That is very admirable, Lee-san,” he said. “I don’t know that I would have that kind of courage if I had to fight without my power.”

Now Gaara recognized the emotion in Lee’s face: absolute shock. His mouth dropped open and everything. Then the biggest grin Gaara had seen yet slowly spread across Lee’s face.

“Yosh! I am sure you would, Gaara-san! Your spirit is bright, and your heart is true! You would certainly be up to the challenge! No villain would stand against you!” He finished with another confident pose, feet spread with one fist straight in the air. Then he _winked_.

And Gaara stopped breathing.

It took him starting to get light-headed before he figured he should probably fix that and gasped in a huge breath. With wide eyes, he shook his head a little and decided to blow right past his ridiculous reaction. “Thanks,” he said shortly, then spun and continued walking.

“You are most welcome!”

Later after checking the park, a couple public fountains, some mansions’ gardens, and even the sewers, Gaara was about ready to give up. He was starting to get nostalgic for the streets of Suna, even with random civilians glaring at and avoiding him. _At least Suna is clean_ , he thought, flicking a bit of grime off his shoulder.

“Do not despair, Gaara-san! I am sure we will prevail in finding the waterfall you seek!”

“And I’m sure I will prevail in putting whoever decided on this annoying, useless clue in a coffin made of my sand, but I don’t see either of those happening anytime soon.”

Lee laughed. “Ah, your humor is most hip, my friend! What a brilliant way of keeping our attitudes positive!”

Gaara opened his mouth to respond that he wasn’t exactly joking—what could he say, relapses happen to reforming psychopaths too— only to be interrupted by his stomach gurgling. He fought a flush as Lee started laughing again.

“Though I see it is not enough to keep our stomachs full!” Lee grinned. “Would you like to get dinner? I know an amazing barbecue restaurant not far from here!”

“That sounds acceptable,” Gaara said. As he followed Lee down a new street, he considered how weirdly enjoyable the day had been. He had never been the most patient of people and would have thought that a whole afternoon spent on a wild goose chase would have pushed him over the edge into bloody, sandy homicide, but Lee had made it almost… _fun_. Between his physical antics with his bizarre self-imposed challenges and his oddly endearing and extremely sunny personality tics, Gaara had been kept both on his toes and entertained all day. Plus, Lee had been so kind, going out of his way to help Gaara out and now offering to take him to dinner. Perhaps, even though everyone in Konoha was crazy, that did not preclude some of them being good people too.

“I have really appreciated your help today,” Gaara said, turning his head to look at Lee. “Even though our efforts weren’t fruitful, you made the search enjoyable.”

Lee beamed and threw a punch up in the air. “Yosh! I too have had an excellent time exploring Konoha with you!”

Gaara nodded to him, then faced forward again, continuing on their way. He was struck once again by the strangeness of Konoha’s citizens. They seemed unruffled by anything, even as Lee began to express his happiness with broad jumps, looking like nothing less than a very shiny frog. He wondered if it was just the wealth of wacky happenings in Konoha that caused this almost apathy or if it was just what people were like in this country. Either way, he had seen throughout the day that its people were very different from Suna’s civilians.

“Look, Gaara-san, we are almost there!” Lee said, pointing ahead of them at a sign that read _Yakiniku Q_ and had big yellow lightbulbs on the side. “They serve the best salted beef tongue in Konoha!”

Gaara took another step towards the restaurant, wondering whether to have beef or—BOOM!

The third and fourth stories of the building across the street from them exploded, raining brick and metal on the street below. Gaara yanked the cork from his gourd and sent sand speeding through the air to form a floating barrier, protecting most of the crowd.

“Can you lead the people away? I’ll try and find who or what caused this,” Gaara said, already having tracked the trajectory and scanning the estimated point of origin.

“Though I am positive the will of fire burns bright in the people of Konoha, your suggestion is the best way to keep them safe! I will clear away all of the bystanders in the next ninty seconds or I will run forty laps around Konoha!”

As Lee sped off to corral the mob, Gaara finally spotted a blond person in a black-and-red cloak, rubbing their hands together and cackling maniacally. He was going to go out on a limb here and say that was probably the villain. Maybe.

He gathered his sand into a disc beneath his feet then propelled himself up and away until he was hovering in front of them. He crossed his arms and looked them up and down. “Hello there. Can I help you with something?”

“Get out of the way, un! I can’t see my art!” the blond said, flapping his arms a little as if to swat Gaara out of the sky.

Gaara raised an eyebrow. “Are you referring to the explosion?”

“Duh.”

“The one that caused major damage to both property and innocent people?”

“The blood splatters really add a nice touch, right?”

Gaara paused. “I see.” He flung out his hand, sand following the motion and moving to pen in the villain in an oh-so-hated dome. For a moment, he thought the case was closed, but then sand exploded out in large holes all around. The little sand that was left collapsed, the integrity of the structure lost with all the gaps throughout. The blond, who had until now looked crazy and amused, now looked crazy and irritated.

Gaara moved his platform back a couple feet, just in case.

He was just considering how else to subdue them when an orange blur came streaking up the side of the building and stopped on the roof a few feet away from the villain. When the wind died down, Gaara could see an older teen, probably around his age, with blond hair and an orange jumpsuit, with one knee and one fist down on the ground and the other hand resting on the upright knee. The teen looked up and glared at the villain, showing off fiery blue eyes and a mischievous smirk.

“Hey asshole,” the teen said. “Looks like a mess down there, ya know?”

He could practically see the criminal’s head explode.

“WHAT’D YOU JUST SAY, YOU UNCULTURED HEATHEN SWINE?!”

The teen’s smirk widened. “Oh, was I too quiet?” He stood up and cupped his hands around his mouth. “YOUR EXPLOSION IS A HEAP OF SHIT! IT’S PRACTICALLY MINIMALIST!”

The criminal’s mouth dropped open and they paused with their arm cocked back, gripping what looked to Gaara like simple clay, though he doubted that was all it was. “Excuse me?” Their arm fell, and they took a step forward, their face screwing up again in rage. “ _How_ is _my art_ minimalist?!”

The teen rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know…” He looked at the villain out of the corner of his eye, which was practically sparkling with puckish intent. “Seems like there’s nothing much going on, ya know? Did your explosion even go off, Deidara?”

Deidara let out a strangled scream of fury and rapidly flung a half dozen lumps of clay at the teen. At almost the same time, the teen raised his right hand in a claw, brought it back to his hip, then thrust it forward. A giant gale of wind expelled from his palm, knocking the clay off course to explode in midair. The wind was so strong it kept going and hit Deidara. However, instead of knocking them down, it simply flipped their cloak up and over their face.

The battlefield paused. Then the teen burst out laughing, clutching his gut as Deidara spluttered and tried to push down the black-and-red fabric. While the criminal was struggling, the teen looked over at Gaara and waved his arm.

“Hey! You wanna jump in?”

Gaara swiftly sent his sand out, forming long tendrils and aiming for Deidara’s hands. _If they can’t grab their clay, they can’t cause explosions_ , he thought. _Hopefully_.

Unfortunately, the criminal recovered faster than he thought and was just able to dodge, spinning out of the way with an ostentatious whirl of their cloak. Luckily, the other teen was suddenly there, twisting a wrist and sending more wind to keep Deidara spinning. After a half dozen more revolutions, they stumbled out of the whirlwind, seemingly not able to focus.

Gaara tried to capture their hands again now that they were disoriented, but they again were able to avoid his sand, dropping into a crouch and going for more clay. They stood up, quickly hurling bombs at both Gaara and the other teen.

Gaara sent a bullet of sand to surround the clay coming at him, then rapidly shot it straight up, only making it about fifteen feet before it exploded. He looked back down to see the other teen spinning around, catching the clay in a newly-made slipstream and throwing it back at the villain. The clay exploded too fast for Deidara to duck and caught them right in the chest, knocking them down and back.

Gaara had been preparing while the other teen made his move and quickly sent his sand to trap Deidara’s hands, lashing them to the roof. Their struggling increased, their whole body jerking even as they glared at both Gaara and the other teen.

“Let me go, un! We’ll see how you like my art when your arms are lying twelve feet away from your torso! It’ll be the prettiest—MMPH!”

Gaara had gotten tired of their threats and moved some sand up to cover their mouth. For good measure, he made some cover their nose too. After about a minute and a half of slowly decreasing thrashing, they passed out, head dropping forward. Gaara quickly removed the makeshift gag, then maneuvered his sand so that Deidara was lying on the roof.

He looked to the other teen. “Do you have anything to bind their hands?”

The teen smiled. “Believe it! And even better, I know some people who can take care of them from here.”

Gaara squinted at the teen, suspicious of his last statement. He seemed like a standard Konoha citizen—that is to say: _crazy_ —but at least it wasn’t crazy-insane like Deidara. On the other hand, who could tell one way or the other, especially in Konoha? And how to go about determining which one the teen was without tipping him off to Gaara’s suspicion?

“That seems rather suspicious.”

Perfect.

The teen’s grin broadened. “Don’t worry, I’ll show you where. It’s actually where you’ve been looking for all day, Gaara.”

…Well, that didn’t help with the suspicion.

“How do you know that? And how do you know my name?” Gaara asked quietly, mentally nudging his sand just in case.

“I was called back to Konoha for the same reason you were brought here,” he explained. “But I’ll leave that for the head honcho to explain.”

“And why should I believe you?”

“Do you remember the motto on the letterhead?”

Gaara wasn’t going to admit he never saw the actual message, but he thought he remembered Temari commenting on the “damn pretentious maxim” at the top. Now what had she said…?

“I believe it was: ‘Those who break the rules are trash’…”

“…‘but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash.’” the teen finished. “Yeah, that’s like the boss’s personal proverb or something. It’s his go-to saying for every lesson, no matter how crazy the path he has to take to get there.” He stuck his hand out. “Uzumaki Naruto.”

Gaara hesitated, not quite convinced. He’d been trying to be more circumspect lately, a side effect of endeavoring to become a better person. _Eh, fuck it_ , he thought as he shook Naruto’s hand, _what’s the worst that can happen?_ “Sabaku no Gaara,” he said. “But then, you knew that.”

Naruto gave a sunny grin. “Yeah, I did.” He waved a careless hand in Deidara’s general direction. “You cool with taking care of transporting them?”

Gaara shrugged. “Sure.” He directed his sand to carry the criminal, floating down on his sand disc until they both reached the ground. He looked up to see how Naruto was going to get down and was slightly alarmed to see him simply jump off the roof. He free-fell for a moment, then slowed down somehow and seemed to glide gracefully down to the ground. If Gaara looked closely, he could see concentrated air coming from Naruto’s open palms to slow his descent.

Once Naruto touched down next to him, Gaara looked around the empty street. He wondered where Lee had got off to and was surprised to feel disappointment at the thought of never seeing the other teen again.

“GAARA-SAN!”

For the first time in his life, Gaara _jumped_ in surprise. He unthinkingly dropped Deidara as he whirled around to find Lee standing in yet another pose: feet spread with one hand on his hip and the other in a two-fingered salute against one brow.

“BUSHY-BROWS!”

Konoha was not going to be good for his blood pressure, Gaara could already tell. He was just able to keep himself from starting again, simply swiveled to face Naruto instead. The blond teen was grinning at Lee, practically bouncing over to offer his hand for a high-five. Lee beamed back and smacked his palm against Naruto’s.

“Naruto! I have not seen you in so long! How was your training trip?”

“Eh,” Naruto said, reaching up to rub the back of his neck again. “it was kinda hard to keep the pervy sage on track, but I learned some good techniques. It’s good to be home though!”

“It is good to have you back! We should plan a gathering for all our friends now that you have returned!”

“Yeah, that sounds great! We should get ramen! I haven’t seen old man Teuchi in ages!”

Lee laughed. “Ah, Naruto, I have truly missed you!” He turned to Gaara then. “You are welcome, of course, Gaara-san! Our friends are a wonderful group, full of youthful spirit! They will welcome you with open arms!”

“Perhaps I will come, then,” Gaara said, inclining his head. “However, it seems that I will no longer be able to join you for dinner.”

Lee looked over to where he had Deidara once again encased in sand. “Yes, I see you have something to take care of. But do not worry, Gaara-san! We can meet another time for dinner!”

Gaara blushed lightly, annoyed at himself for the involuntary recurrence. “I would like that.”

Lee practically glowed with the brightness of his grin. “Yosh! That sounds perfect! I will leave you to your duties now. Goodbye Naruto! I will see you later, Gaara-san!”

And he ran off.

“How d’you know Bushy-Brows?” Naruto asked as he walked along the street, heading in the same direction Gaara and Lee had been walking earlier.

Gaara explained how they had met and how Lee had offered to help him find the stupid waterfall. At Gaara’s description of some of the places they had looked, Naruto started laughing.

“I’m not laughing at you, I swear,” Naruto said, settling down a bit, though there was still mirth in his voice. “It’s just that has sensei written all over it: some vague statement that acts like a silly riddle but is really just incredibly unhelpful.”

“I was skeptical at finding a waterfall in such a large city as Konoha,” Gaara said, noticing but not caring as Deidara’s head hit a low hanging business sign.

“Yeah, it’s not a real waterfall,” Naruto said, pointing straight ahead. Gaara looked in that direction and saw a two-paneled shoji door with an intricate painting of a waterfall between two vine-covered cliffs. Naruto walked forward and slid the right-hand door open, gesturing for Gaara to go through first. He eyed the other teen warily but moved into the building.

He’s not sure what he was expecting, but a small shop full of adult romance novels was not it. He looked around, just noticing a man slumped behind the counter at the back. He had spiky gray hair and was giggling occasionally as he read his book. Naruto bounded forward, bee-lining for the counter.

“Kakashi-sensei! I’m back!” he said. _Wait,_ this _is his sensei?_ Gaara thought. When his proclamation got no reaction, Naruto huffed. “Hey sensei! Could you stop reading your pervy book long enough to say ‘hi’ to your favorite student?”

“Maa, Naruto, I don’t see Sakura anywhere,” Kakashi said, eyes still on his book. He casually flipped another page.

“Senseeeei,” Naruto whined. “What are you doing here anyway? Lose a bet?”

“Hm,” Kakashi affirmed. “With Tsunade-sama.”

For some reason, this made Naruto blanch. “Well, that’s terrifying. Any chance you’ve seen the pervy sage anywhere? I think I want to extend our trip.”

“Parting is such sweet sorrow and all that,” Kakashi said unconcernedly, then chuckled again at something in his book.

“I’m gone for three years and this is the welcome I get?!” He paused, then an evil smile began to grow. “I guess you don’t want your present then…”

“Huh? I don’t need any souvenir from your travels, Naruto-kun.”

“Not even an advance copy of _Icha Icha Tactics_?”

Kakashi abruptly closed his book and sat up straight, finally looking at his student.

“Jiraiya-sama finished it already? It wasn’t scheduled to publish for eight more months.”

“Yeah, he said something about needing a break from me bothering him making him finish faster,” Naruto said with a shrug. “Anyway, I’d love to get you the book, Kaka-sensei, but I have that meeting with the boss pretty soon. And the faster I get there, the faster we can start and finish, and the faster I can run back here and give it to you, ya know,” he finished with a breezy smile.

Kakashi immediately reached under the counter. Gaara heard a click and a section of the wall in the corner pushed forward and slid open with a whir, revealing a bare metal door with some strange grooves in part of the frame. Kakashi stood up and went over, causing more mechanical sounds as he did something. The movements were entirely hidden by his body, but after almost twenty seconds of waiting, the metal door popped open with a hydraulic _whoosh_ of stale air. Kakashi stepped back, moving to eagerly push Naruto to the door.

“Have a good playdate, my cute student! And give my best to the big crybaby!”

“EW SENSEI! I’m not gonna flirt for you! You wanna be all gross with your boyfriend, do it yourself!”

Gaara followed Naruto in, then turned around like him to face the shop again. Kakashi lifted his hand and wiggled his fingers in a lazy wave and closed the door. The elevator started moving with no prompting.

A few moments passed in silence, then Gaara decided to ask a question that had been bugging him for a bit.

“Minimalist?”

“What?” Naruto said, turning to face Gaara.

“Earlier, you called Deidara’s art ‘minimalist’. You just don’t seem the type to know artistic movements.”

“I’ve fought them before, ya know,” Naruto said. “I found out that the easiest way to get them riled up was to insult their art, so I did some research. Once they’re all fired up to defend their work, they get easier to defeat.” He grinned. “It’s fun to make them blow up like that, pun intended!” He snickered.

“Your dedication is commendable,” Gaara said, revising some of his impressions of the other teen.

Naruto blushed.

“Eh, it’s nothing.”

They passed another short while in silence until the elevator stopped.

“Now this,” Naruto said as the door opened, “this is something.”

They stepped out onto a glass walkway with thin steel railings overlooking a bustling workspace surrounded by tall windows. People moved back and forth between different areas, carrying and tinkering with everything from ancient-looking relics to high-tech gadgets that Gaara couldn’t begin to guess the purpose of. The space was just as eclectic a mix, modern clear and chrome tables side-by-side with ornately carved wooden desks next to bean bags, each with a matching lap desk. Gaara looked up and found headless Bodhisattva sculptures mounted high up on the side walls. Straight across from where they were standing was another elaborate mural, this one depicting a complex battle between nine different demons.

Naruto started walking along the left-hand path, greeting every person they passed by name and asking personalized questions of each of them. They passed out of the workroom and entered another room with the same surrounding walkway, though this one circled a gym-like area. There was hardly any traditional gym equipment though, most of the people in the room seemingly training with various powers instead. Gaara could see a pink-haired woman throwing a punch from above at a blonde woman, only to miss and gouge a hole in the floor. Further along was another teen, this one with red tattooed canines on his cheeks, claws on his fingers, and several other wolf-like characteristics, sparring with a dark-haired woman who quickly moved and tried to hit the boy with her white-glowing palms.

“Naruto-kun!”

A man with a brown ponytail and a scar on his nose approached them with a brilliant grin. He grabbed Naruto up in a tight hug, squeezing the happily laughing boy.

“Iruka-sensei!” _Jeez, how many senseis does this guy have?_ Gaara thought.

Iruka put Naruto down and stepped back. “It’s so great to see you! You’ve grown so tall in the last three years! When you left, you only topped my shoulder, and that’s if I counted your hair!”

“Aw, Iruka-sensei!” Naruto whined. “Why’d ya have to bring that up in front of my new friend?!” He turned back to Gaara. “Gaara, this is Umino Iruka. He was my sensei when I was a little kid.”

Gaara nodded to the man. “A pleasure, Umino-san. I am Sabaku no Gaara.”

Iruka nodded back with a smile. “Any friend of Naruto’s is welcome here.”

“He’s here for the big meeting, sensei,” Naruto piped up. Iruka looked back at Gaara, his gaze turning calculating as he sized him up. Gaara fought the urge to straighten his already good posture.

“I see. Sabaku, you said? From Suna?”

Gaara bobbed his head again.

“Hmm,” Iruka said, gaze still intense. Then suddenly, he relaxed and an oppressive air Gaara hadn’t noticed until now disappeared. “You’d best be going then. Shouldn’t keep him waiting.”

Naruto nodded. “Good idea. We’ll catch up later, Iruka-sensei! Maybe over some ramen?” he said with a grin.

Iruka smiled helplessly back. “Maybe, Naruto-kun. Now go,” he said, shooing them with his hands.

They stepped around the man and went further down the walkway.

“Oh, and Gaara-san?”

He turned at the man’s call, raising an eyebrow.

“I’ll take care of them,” he said, gesturing to Deidara. Gaara looked at Naruto, who bobbed his head. He sent his sand over to Iruka, tipping the criminal upright and pulling away when Iruka had a good hold.

“Thank you, Umino-san,” Gaara said.

Iruka just waved a hand over his shoulder as he walked away, Deidara lying like a sack of grain over his shoulder.

Gaara and Naruto continued along the walkway until they passed out of the gym and into a more traditional office area. They went down a wide hallway, passing open doors that showed offices and meeting rooms.

“What exactly is this place?” Gaara asked.

“The HQ of the Allied Shinobi Forces,” Naruto responded promptly. “See, a long, looong time ago, the Five Great Countries were protected by super cool ninja!” He paused. “I mean, they also did assassinations and other shady stuff, but they mainly kept people safe. So now that’s what we do—the protecting, not the suspicious parts,” Naruto clarified seriously. Then he smiled, but gently, not like most of what he had shown Gaara so far. There was something immense about it, something that made this small expression even bigger than his sunny grins. “We’re the shield that shelters the innocent.”

They turned a corner and went through the door of a large, glass-enclosed meeting room. There were seven others already there standing around a big conference table, an eclectic group and all seemingly older than the two of them, though a few of them not by much.

“Yo!” Naruto called, waving a hand enthusiastically. Gaara chose to simply nod.

The red-haired man snorted. “Great, more kids.”

“EXCUSE ME?!” the short man with pink eyes shouted, whirling around to glare across the room.

The other man smirked. “What’s wrong, kiddo? Miss your afternoon nap?”

A moment later, the short man was standing inches away from him, apparently having traveled through the glass walls somehow. He smirked up at the slightly taller man. “You wanna say that again?”

“Alright, let’s calm down,” the giant man said, stepping forward from where he had been standing slightly behind the red-haired man.

“Aw, but I wanted to see who won! It’s so boring in here!” the green-haired woman whined, slumping dramatically on the blonde woman next to her. The blonde rolled her eyes but let the other girl hang off her shoulder without protest.

“Do you know when this meeting is set to begin?” the black-haired man asked Naruto. Naruto opened his mouth—

“Well now that blondie elected to finally show up, we can begin right now.”

They all turned back toward the door where a man was standing with his feet spread and his arms crossed. He was dressed in all black, from his leather boots to his eyepatch and his spiky hair. He had an air of complete competence about him, even while standing still, such that Gaara assumed this was the “boss” Naruto had been referring to.

“Hey hey, Obito, it isn’t my fault we’re late! We had to stop Deidara from blowing up the building just across the street!” Naruto said, flailing his arms a bit. “You would think there would be someone else to keep the villains off our front lawn, but since no one else stepped up, me and Gaara here took care of it.” He hooked his thumb at Gaara to show the room who he meant, and everyone’s eyes slipped to him instead of Obito.

“It was quite the battle,” he confirmed. Everyone continued to stare, most looking expectant. What, did they want a blow-by-blow recap?

“A fight so close! So sad we missed it! Maybe next one we can give an assist?” the white-haired man said, a rhythm seemingly built-in to his words.

As most eyes shifted to the rapping man, Gaara saw Obito sigh. He thought he heard the man murmur something like, “I already regret this,” but he couldn’t be sure.

“Okay people, take a seat and I’ll take a sedative and we’ll all get through this somehow,” Obito said, gesturing to the chairs around the conference table as he moved to take the seat on the end. They all grabbed a seat, the red-haired and pink-eyed men purposely separating themselves and the green-haired woman tugging her chair over until it was flush against the blonde’s. When they were all settled, Obito began.

“As all of you should know by now, this is ASF headquarters. We were founded sixty-five years ago by Senju Hashirama, Uchiha Madara, Senju Tobirama, and Uzumaki Mito. Our founders knew the world was beginning to encounter threats beyond anything seen in our modern history and no one was prepared to handle them. ASF was their solution. We are a response agency that identifies, locates, and neutralizes dangerous people and situations whose threat profile is outside the scope of regular authorities.” He paused, taking in the blank faces around him. “Basically, we organize heroes to fight villains and save the world.”

“Over the past four years, we’ve received intelligence that a new power is rising in the shadows. We don’t know much about them yet, but what we do know is enough to prompt a new kind of answer. We’re putting together a team.”

Obito swiveled his head until he had met each of their eyes.

“We want you.”

There was complete silence for about ten seconds. Gaara was looking around at their little group, considering each of them again in light of this new information. Then—

“Ne, boss, why us?” Naruto asked. “There’s hundreds of heroes out there! What makes us so special?”

Obito smiled, slightly amused but mostly evil, though that may have just been how the expression pulled at the scars on his face.

“I’m sure you’ll figure it out in time. So, what do you all say?”

Silence again as they all considered.

“Sounds like fun!” the green-haired woman piped up, smiling in a way that reminded Gaara of both Naruto and Lee.

“It would be quite the honor to represent my country on such a team,” the black-haired man said quietly.

“I’m in,” the giant man said simply, causing the red-haired man to huff.

“I guess I am, too.”

The blonde woman inclined her head to Obito. “I would be proud to help protect so many.”

“A team meant to defend humanity? To deny this chance would be insanity!”

The pink-eyed man eyed the rapper with mild disgust. “Ugh, I guess you should have someone competent on this team. Sure, I’ll do it.”

Naruto grinned and threw a thumbs-up at Obito. “You know I’m in! We’ll keep everyone safe, believe it!” Then he turned to Gaara expectantly.

Did he want to do this? He had just started getting along with his siblings, had just started to establish himself in Suna. Did he really want to uproot his life for this idea that they might be something special? He looked across the room and met Obito’s eyes, seeing neither the fire that was in Lee’s eyes, nor the spark he’d found in Naruto’s, but a burning ember, the kind that lasts forever if it has the slightest bit of encouragement, the kind that seems to exist on faith alone.

It was enough.

“I’m not sure I’m a hero, but I cannot think of a better way to find out.”

Obito smiled, his eyes softening a bit as if he understood.

“Well then, welcome everyone, to the Jinchuriki Initiative.”


End file.
